patrick.net

Peter P,

Gates hasn't stepped down just yet has he? I thought that would be phased out over the next year or so. Well, either way you are now free to explore other alternatives.

Godless: The Church of Liberalism - Ann Coulter

terrific....

Or teach them to grow crops suitable for their climate, not just corn, but the kind of corn or another crop that will thrive in their area.

True. Also, I think population control though education is important. The idea is to empower people with choices.

Giving poor countries food will only condemn them to perpetual poverty. Everybody dies sooner or later. Saving lives today or tomorrow will not make this a better world. We need to help people help themselves. This is the way to end poverty.

Gates hasn’t stepped down just yet has he?

He stepped down as the CEO a few fears ago. However, he is still the Chairman of the Board.

yeah, there never was a labor-saving device invented yet...

Well, either way you are now free to explore other alternatives.

Yes, I like FireFox better.

Nobodies worth that kind of money except God. Gates and Buffet are avoiding paying taxes by putting their excess money in trusts. Who looses? American tax payers.

Maybe Gates and Buffett decided they would rather do something about poverty and disease among the poorest of the poor, rather than provide support to the imperial aspirations of George W. Bush. Of course, if Bush had his way the charitable deduction "tax dodge" would be unnecessary, because you could pass 100% of your wealth to your kids without paying any estate tax.

SFWoman,

I understand that both Bill and Paul were perfectly approachable before the "pie incident" in Denmark? Since then they have both stepped up personal security and one fan was escorted out of a Blazer game b/c he "touched" Paul Allen on the shoulder during a game. The fan claimed he didn't really know who Paul Allen was but it was perceived as a threat.

Anne Coulter is possessed!

the big test is whether she can actually walk thru the door of a church without frying...

Better to feed them well and teach them to grow their own, and teach birth control, just extra food without education seems to end up producing more starving mouths.

Exactly.

did you know pollution over europe seemed to cause climactic change which lowered rainfall over ethiopia, thus inadvertently bringing on the famines?

did you know pollution over europe seemed to cause climactic change which lowered rainfall over ethiopia, thus inadvertently bringing on the famines?

It was unfortunate.

did you know pollution over europe seemed to cause climactic change which lowered rainfall over ethiopia, thus inadvertently bringing on the famines?

Yes, Western civilization and technology are the root of all evil.

Before there were markets, money, factories, cars, cellphones, televisions, computers, etc., people lived in perfect communal harmony with each other and nature. Noone ever went without a meal or had a toothache, injury or infection which might benefit from medical attention. There was never a dispute over land, food, sex or religion. The world was a land without scarcity or strife of any kind. There was perpetual happiness and gumdrops grew on trees and the children laughed and played in rivers of chocolate.

newsfreak Says:
I guess many places around the world now seed the clouds for rain and snow?

hmm, i don't think it works quite that easily... all the desert areas of the world tend to be about the same latitude, often caused by dry prevailing winds especially where there are coastal mountain ranges which cause all the rain to fall on the coast and not inland... so not much moisture in the air to form clouds or precipitate...

*disclaimer: not climatology advice *

Yes, Western civilization and technology are the root of all evil.

probably quite a lot of it, but it's not all evil...

paleolithic peoples didn't really have the choice of mobile phones...

altho if we keep consuming without restraint, we might just end up back there...

yes, wiki also says there are a few places they seed the clouds... they can get a 30% increase in rainfall... not sure what conditions are required for success, e.g. % relative humidity, temp, etc...

people lived in perfect communal harmony with each other and nature. There was perpetual happiness and gumdrops grew on trees and the children laughed and played in rivers of chocolate.

is this another critique of the boomers and flower power?

On a summer day in the month of May a burly bum came hiking
Down a shady lane through the sugar cane, he was looking for his liking.
As he roamed along he sang a song of the land of milk and honey
Where a bum can stay for many a day, and he won't need any money

Oh the buzzin' of the bees in the cigarette trees near the soda water fountain,
At the lemonade springs where the bluebird sings on the Big Rock Candy Mountains

There's a lake of gin we can both jump in, and the handouts grow on bushes
In the new-mown hay we can sleep all day, and the bars all have free lunches
Where the mail train stops and there ain't no cops, and the folks are tender-hearted
Where you never change your socks and you never throw rocks,
And your hair is never parted

Oh the buzzin' of the bees in the cigarette trees near the soda water fountain,
At the lemonade springs where the bluebird sings on the Big Rock Candy Mountains

Oh, a farmer and his son, they were on the run, to the hay field they were bounding
Said the bum to the son, "Why don't you come to the big rock candy mountains?"
So the very next day they hiked away, the mileposts they were counting
But they never arrived at the lemonade tide, on the Big Rock Candy Mountains

Oh the buzzin' of the bees in the cigarette trees near the soda water fountain,
At the lemonade springs where the bluebird sings on the Big Rock Candy Mountains

One evening as the sun went down and the jungle fires were burning,
Down the track came a hobo hiking, and he said "Boys, I'm not turning."
"I'm heading for a land that's far away beside the crystal fountains;"
"So come with me, we'll go and see the Big Rock Candy Mountains."

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains, there's a land that's fair and bright,
The handouts grow on bushes and you sleep out every night
Where the boxcars all are empty and the sun shines every day
On the birds and the bees and the cigarete trees,
The lemonade springs where the bluebird sings
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains, all the cops have wooden legs
And the bulldogs all have rubber teeth and the hens lay soft-boiled eggs
The farmer's trees are full of fruit and the barns are full of hay
Oh I'm bound to go where there ain't no snow
Where the rain don't fall, the wind don't blow
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains, you never change your socks
And little streams of alcohol come a-trickling down the rocks
The brakemen have to tip their hats and the railroad bulls are blind
There's a lake of stew and of whiskey too
And you can paddle all around 'em in a big canoe
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

In the Big Rock Candy Mountains the jails are made of tin,
And you can walk right out again as soon as you are in
There ain't no short-handled shovels, no axes, saws or picks,
I'm a-goin' to stay where you sleep all day
Where they hung the jerk that invented work
In the Big Rock Candy Mountains

I'll see you all this comin' fall in the Big Rock Candy Mountains!

Interesting (and revealing) side-note: If you try to Google the lyrics to Pete Seeger's version "Big Rock Candy Mountain", you quickly find that every commercial music site has been ordered to remove these lyrics at Mr. Seegers request. I had to pull them from here.

Apparently the irony of enforcing intellectual property law on a song about a hobo's anti-materialist utopia was lost on Mr. Seeger.

Mike,

I know that I don’t actually take delivery of the pork or oil, but actually sell it at a future date to someone who does. What is someone taking delivery of when they sell a housing futures contract, and where did the initial asset come from to buy or sell?

There is not necessarily any exchange of goods in the futures trade of pork or oil. In fact, usually not. Not by you nor by anyone else. The trades are settled either in cash or with offsetting trades.

From Options, Futures and Other Derivatives, John C. Hull, 5th ed. (the bible on derivatives, if you want to learn how they work):

Closing Out Positions

The vast majority of futures contracts do not lead to delivery. The reason is that most traders choose to close out their positions prior to the delivery period specified in the contract. Closing out a position means entering into the opposite type of trade from the original one. For example the New York investor who bought a July corn futures contract on March 5 can close out the position by selling (i.e. shorting) one July corn futures contract on April 20. The Kansas investor who sold (i.e. shorted) a July contract on March 5 can close out the position by buying one July contract on April 20. In each case, the investor's total gain or loss is determined by the change in the futures price between March 5 and April 20.

...so a market of futures based upon a method-driven housing index as the underlying is not necessarily unsound. The question is in the index methodology. But such a market is no more "mysterious" or "vodoo" than an option on an equity index, or any of the various options or futures on ETFs.

There are futures on SPDRs.

There are futures on SPDRs.

So we have...

S&P 500 index funds
SPY
SPY options
SPX options
SP futures
SP futures options
ES futures
ES futures options
SPDR futures

How many ways do we need to "play" the S&P 500 index?

HARM,
Hilarious! Typical communist--Seeger would rather be sure that *no one* can have access to a good or service than let someone make money off of it.

Hilarious! Typical communist–Seeger would rather be sure that *no one* can have access to a good or service than let someone make money off of it.

Yes, in order to make everyone equally happy, they make everyone equally miserable.

Funny development, and one bound to stir joy in the hearts of JBR's every where!

We had a slight summer storm here in the Portland, OR area, nothing major (like in the mid-west) and after a few "dropped calls" from clients cell phones I'd thought the worst was over?

Turns out this brief and minor storm accumulated enough rain to strip away and buckle our rented gutter! Damn! The whole thing is dangling down about two feet! I'm no expert but with the shingles and tar paper it ripped off I'd say you're looking at about $500 minimum! And these soon to be "repartments" are not even two years old. Uh, it only rains about 10 months out of the year here, you'd think they'd have this whole gutter thing down by now? Damn!

Is this what you guys mean when you say "shitbox"?

Man am I ever glad the "owner" declined our generous offer of 180K! This was just on the garage where you could repair it with a six foot ladder. Think how much fun (and expense) it will be to re-gutter the entire second floor! What a mess, what shitbox. Thank you Lord.

For the guys here, I don't know about you but Mrs. DinOR wouldn't care what it took she would want that fixed before she got home! At the very least before the engagement dinner here this coming Saturday.

"But hon, it's a very "special" gutter, they have to ship it in from Muncie, IN"!

Yeah......... right. Just fix it Mister.

I'm now planning to do a photo scrapbook documenting the demise of a shitbox. God this is funny, TWO years old!

I’m now planning to do a photo scrapbook documenting the demise of a shitbox. God this is funny, TWO years old!

Who built that stuff?

Peter P,

Unlike CA many homes and condos in OR are built by small independent operators and most are actually quite good. I met the "builder" one time and he was fishing for compliments and I really didn't have any for him. Genuine or otherwise. For a 1,450 sq. ft. condo to have only ONE phone jack in an "up scale" unit made it difficult to "home office". Actually there are several phone jacks in the bedrooms but only ONE in the main room.

The other night I was on our back deck and I noticed the unit on the opposite end's deck was starting to shall we say......... settle? I don't exactly have an eye for art but you could see that the handrail was lower toward the river than to the house. (It didn't used to be that way).

I’m now planning to do a photo scrapbook documenting the demise of a shitbox. God this is funny, TWO years old!

Oh, please do! Can't wait --we'll have to make a thread out of it.

Your advice about not buying anything built during the bubble was spot-on. Just look at all the Lennar lawsuits going on in FL due to shoddy construction. Ben's blog has an article about it at least once a week.

For a 1,450 sq. ft. condo to have only ONE phone jack in an “up scale” unit made it difficult to “home office”. Actually there are several phone jacks in the bedrooms but only ONE in the main room.

We use wireless everthing now, with cordless phone and wi-fi, so the lack of phone jacks does not bother us too much.

HARM,

Will do! Daughter #2 has a digital camera so this will be a snap. I understand that any deck should slope away from the house "slightly" after all this is Oregon. But the deck is so obviously lop-sided it isn't funny.

But the deck is so obviously lop-sided it isn’t funny.

I remember going to an open house in Palo Alto recently... I nearly lost my balance walking around the house.

Peter P,

That is what we ultimately learned. We now have a wireless modem and can fax, surf and talk at the same time. It took some doing and a little trial and error but we finally got it dialed in. In order to install add'l jacks that would have been an expense. Since there is no crawl space they have to go into the attic. Not fun. Wouldn't it have been better to just put a few in before the drywall went up?

Peter P,

I'm told, in time ALL homes settle. No big there. But these were built right on a creek. If this is the result after two years what will they look like in 20?

Enjoy savory gourmet pizzas, caeser salads, fresh strawberries, ice cream and flavored lemonades.

No caviar? :(

tannenbaum,

Who are they going to get to skydive? FB's with nothing left to lose?

Who are they going to get to skydive? FB’s with nothing left to lose?

Hopefully the divers will experience a softer landing than the FBs.

Rainmaking- I read that the Chinese routinely seed clouds to get rain and to break up hailstorms.

Or one can intensify storms like they did in State of Fear. :)

"Hopefully the divers will experience a softer landing than the FB's"

LOL! Damn!

They're resorting to "car lot" tactics to sell homes! And why not? It's all about the monthly payment isn't it?

If any of you get the chance rent (don't buy) the movie "Slasher".

No it is not a "slasher movie". It's done by John Landis (The Blues Brothers) about the ULTIMATE used car salesman and was shot over a couple of days in Memphis. The guy is a stone alcoholic and car lots from around the country call him in to clear inventory. It's a side of America most Americans don't get to see. Funny stuff.